The Barrow where the Lake House Meteorite was excavated from.

From Pillinger & Pillinger* we know that the Lake House Meteorite wasn't exposed to the weather on the steps for many years prior to its earliest photograph (1899) as the local chalk on its surface hadn't been washed off. This also indicates that its last subterranean home had been close by.

In 1899 the house had been recently bought by Lovibond the brewer and he doesn't seem to have had any connections to archaeology or geology so is unlikely to have been instrumental in its excavation.

However a previous owner Edward Duke had organised the excavation of numerous barrows on the estate and kept the finds in his private museum, the portable objects of which were sold at auction in 1895.

Duke recorded he found a large stone in the barrow he numbered 18. (p586, WANHS vol35:

In the absence of any other evidence or history of the meteorite this seem to be most obvious source of the meteorite. Duke's excavators found it in a barrow and he kept it at Lake House, probably in some outbuilding as a curio. Lovibond as the new owner turned out the barns put it on display. And this is the nub of the Pillinger & Pillinger article.  

But where is Barrow 18? 

The barrow expert and sleuth Simon Banton (check out his barrow map) stepped up to the challenge and reviewed all the evidence in great depth including more recent work on the Lake House Barrows. And whilst the identification isn't certain there is one barrow that fits the description and reported size and has not been identified as one of the other Duke barrows.

Wilsford 81

"A field visit by the OS in 1972 found the barrow to be a mound, 1.15m high, with a diameter of 13m, this is 0.4m higher than Grinsell reported.
The Bronze Age bowl barrow referred to above (1-8) was surveyed at a scale of 1:1000 in May 2009 as part of English Heritage's Stonehenge WHS Landscape Project. It was originally listed as Wilsford 81 by Goddard in 1913. The barrow has an overall diameter of 13.8m and comprises a mound, 1m high, with a slight berm on its northern and western sides plus possible traces of a ditch to the south-west, although this could be a plough line."

The question of where the bronze age barrow builders obtained it from is another question, it is unlikely to have fallen in southern England, so it would be worth investigating Wilsford 81 further, there may be fragments and clues that Duke's diggers missed. And if there still is a large stone there then it can be ruled out as the source.

That it is likely to be yet another example of the large stones manuported to Ancient Wessex from afar seems certain.

*"Pillinger, CT and Pillinger, JM. 2024 Grandfather's stone: the Lake House Meteorite, Britain's largest and earliest extraterrestrial sample. Wilts Arch & Nat Hist Magazine 117, pp 181-196."